Sports

While he was an assistant coach with the National Hockey League's Florida Panthers, Jim Hulton was often tasked with working with the team's younger players.

"I was very comfortable with kids coming out of junior, and they were comfortable with me," the former Kingston Frontenacs coach explained.

"As an assistant coach at the pro level, that's what you do. The head coach looks after the group and the systems, while the assistants work more on an individual basis."

At the end of last season's campaign, the Panthers cleaned house and didn't renew Hulton's contract, leaving the Wolfe Island native standing on the sidelines rather than behind a bench.

After exploring different coaching options during the summer, Hulton and his family committed to staying in Kingston for the 2011-12 season.

"I've lived in rinks for the better part of 15 or 20 years, so it's hard enough not to have a team to coach, but to get completely out of hockey would be next to impossible," he said.

So he started talking with parents and young players involved in the local hockey scene to see if there was a need that was being overlooked.

"I wanted to put my experience in hockey to work in some other business, so I kind of looked for a niche in the hockey market," he said.

So Hulton -- who also counts the Belleville Bulls and Mississauga IceDogs on his Ontario Hockey League coaching resume -- has now created the Jim Hulton Elite Player Development Program for players aged 14 to 19.

He conceded that it's been more than a decade since he coached at the minor hockey level, and that the game has evolved over the years.

"At 14, 15, if you want to progress into junior hockey and eventually into pro hockey, you have to now understand all facets and elements of the game," Hulton said.

In the program, Hulton will offer his coaching expertise to up-and- coming players in hope of taking them to the next level of the sport.

"It just seems like everyone's looking for an edge, whether it's going to power-skating, or a shooting school, or it's going to a stick-handling school," he said.

"It seems the market has exploded now for people looking for some sort of edge in hockey, and this is just another way to take those concepts further."

The seed of starting the program took root in, of all places, Florida.

"I ended up at the end of our Panthers' season being a pproached by a number of parents and did kind of a small-scale version of this down there," he said.

The season-long program will offer two different packages, or players can participate in both.

One offers twice-weekly, hour-long on-ice practices, the other individualized player mentoring.

In his discussions with local hockey folk, Hulton heard how there was dearth of practice time available.

"The demand for ice is so high right now that it greatly limits practice time, and most players improve through practice," he offered. "So, quite simply, there isn't enough time to go around."

Because of that lack of ice time, coaches often don't have enough practice time to work with individual players on honing their skills. Not only that, Hulton said, minor hockey coaches have 20 or so players for which they are responsible.

"They can't devote one whole practice to simply skill development because there's not enough ice time in their season," he said. "So, for a player to develop, it was looking at extra ice time and extra specialized, individualized attention."

That's where Hulton hopes his program comes in. At those on-ice sessions that are to take place at the Invista Centre, he will work with players individually on improving their deficiencies.

In order to do that, he has limited enrolment in the program to just 10 players.

The mentoring program focuses on development away from the rink.

For $600 a month, Hulton will offer a more in-depth analysis of a player's game off the ice.

"That's when I'm going to sit down and I'm really going to micro- manage and analyse every aspect of their game, and then give them a report back on the areas that I think are sufficient and ones they need improvement on, and then give them an overall guideline as to what they should be working on as an individual," Hulton said.

He also will offer his guidance in promoting the player to potential teams, whether it be a college or junior squad, for examples.

To do both the mentoring and on-ice practice time, which costs $225 monthly on its own, the cost is $750 a month.

Hulton is aware that the cost may prove prohibitive to some.

"This isn't going to be something that's attractive or viable for everyone," he said. "It's going to be a limited market, I understand that."

"The reason I chose the ages 14 to 19 is because these are kids that are kind of getting streamlined on the path to hockey," he explained.

"I hate sport specialization, but it's also a fact of life: every sport's going that way now, especially hockey."

He said he is aware of similar development programs in other sports, such as soccer.

Hulton, who also coached the Royal Military College Paladins for a season, hopes that the experience will help him improve as a coach as well.

"You hear all the time how kids are changing and sports are changing," he said.

"As a coach, it's up to me to change with the times, to change with the kids. By working with a select group of, say, 10 (players) between the ages of 14 and 19, I'm going to learn what they need, what they want from a coach, what they best respond to. It's almost going to be like a laboratory for me as well."

Hulton, who started his coaching career as an assistant with the Kingston Voyageurs, is in the midst of creating a website and refining his new business venture, which he considers, at this point, to be a pilot project.

"I'm throwing it out there," he said.

"I'm not sure how it's going to be received, quite frankly, but I think there is a need for it."